TERRA 459: The Flying Dustbin – Part 4

Produced by Raymond Besant

Synopsis

“The Flying Dustbin” is the success story of the Fulmar, a seabird which numbers 500,000 pairs in the UK but was virtually unknown as a breeding species at the turn of the last century. The film documents the reasons for its success, but is also a warning. The Fulmar faces some very serious modern problems, 9 out of 10 Fulmars in the North Sea have plastic in their stomachs whilst global warming is diminishing its natural prey stocks, leading to breeding failures. The film was shot at various locations around Scotland including Aberdeenshire, the Orkney Islands, St Kilda as well as in the Netherlands.

You may also like

A man with a mustached (Robert Sams) mysteriously emerges from the ocean with a briefcase on his way to deliver a report about the four Marine National Monuments of the Pacific Ocean. But his report is anything but or...

The Hannibal Bank Seamount, 20 km west of Coiba Island, Panama, is an ideal natural laboratory to explore the processes that determine both bottom and water-column ecological hotspots. Internationally recognized for i...

In part two of Higher Ground, the battle over Florida's beaches continues. In the middle of this conflict between developers and preservationists are the sea turtles which use this fragile habitat as nesting ground. A...

The Florida coast line is constantly shifting. Natural processes move the sand back and forth, north and south and occasionally a big storm removes it altogether. Of course unnatural processes are also affecting the b...

Episode Stats

2.46KViews0Comments0Likes

About the Producer

Raymond was lucky enough to grow up in the wildlife rich Orkney Islands. When not desperately looking for Hen Harriers summer days were spent exploring seabird islands with his camera in hand. Today, Raymond is still happiest on windy islands surrounded by seabirds and seals! He studied Biology and Chemistry at university in Aberdeen but photography won through and he followed a career in press photography, gaining recognition in the Bell’s Young Press Photographer of the Year competition. During his 20’s Raymond exhibited widely throughout Scotland on subjects as diverse as Spanish religious festivals to the decline of the North East fishing industry. A strong story-telling ethic led him back to his first passion – wildlife. His first film ‘The Flying Dustbin’ documented the problems the Fulmar faces from plastic pollution and won several International wildlife film-making awards. BBC Panorama and The Natural World are now amongst his cinematography credits. Raymond is also really interested in the marine environment and tries to get under the water as often as possible.